Grant News

Awards List July 2017

The Cycle of Life from Mesoamerica: Herencia Sagrada-Día de los Muertos

National Museum of Mexican Art

Chicago, IL

Award: Outright; $40,000.00

Planning for a bilingual traveling exhibition about the Dia de los Muertos festival and

its history in Mexico and the U.S.

A Spectacle in Motion: The Grand Panorama of a Whaling Voyage ‘Round

the World

New Bedford Whaling Museum

New Bedford, MA

Award: Outright; $40,000.00

Development of a traveling exhibition, digital content, and public programs based on a 19th-century panorama painting.

C.M. Russell Museum House and Studio Interpretation Plan

Trigg-C.M. Russell Foundation, Inc.

Great Falls, MT

Award: Match; $40,000.00

Development of an interpretive plan for the historic house and studio of western artist

Charles M. Russell (1864–1926).

Interpretive Plan for "A World Before Cars" Gallery

Long Island Museum of American Art, History, and Carriages

Stony Brook, NY

Award: Outright; $40,000.00

Planning for a permanent exhibition examining the role of horse-drawn vehicles in

American life in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Implementation Grants

Striking Iron: The Art of African Blacksmiths

University of California, Los Angeles

Los Angeles, CA

Award: Outright; $250,000.00

Implementation of a 5,700-square-foot traveling exhibition, a website, and public programs on the history, culture, and art of blacksmithing across the African continent.

The Owens-Thomas House: Interpreting the Dynamics of Urban Slavery in the South

Telfair Museum of Art

Savannah, GA

Award: Outright; $150,000.00

Match; $100,000.00

Implementation of a new interpretation of the Owens-Thomas House to tell the stories of the

free and enslaved people who lived and worked in the house during the 1820s–40s.

One State/One Story: Frankenstein

Indiana Humanities

Indianapolis, IN

Award: Outright; $300,000.00

Implementation of a state-wide, multiformat program that uses the novel Frankenstein to discuss the impacts of scientific and technological

change on human life and society.

Third Coast Conversations:

Dialogues about Water

Michigan Humanities Council

Lansing, MI

Award: Outright; $300,000.00

Implementation of a series of public programs across Michigan that would address the historical, cultural, and environmental impact

of water.

Revisiting the Founding Era

Gilder Lehrman Institute of

American History

New York, NY

Award: Outright; $350,000.00

Implementation of a nationwide library discussion program about the Founding Era (1760–1800) and its contemporary resonances.

Georgia O'Keeffe: Visions of Hawai'i

New York Botanical Garden

Bronx, NY

Award: Outright; $250,000.00

Implementation of a traveling exhibition and public programs exploring the historical and

ecological contexts surrounding artist Georgia O’Keeffe’s commercial art commission by the Hawaiian Pineapple Company in the late 1930s.

Sick: Seven Diseases That

Changed Brooklyn

Brooklyn Historical Society

Brooklyn, NY

Award: Outright; $100,000.00

Match; $150,000.00

Implementation of a permanent exhibition, an accompanying website, educational materials, and public programs exploring the 400-year history of public health in Brooklyn.

Leonard Bernstein: The Power of Music

National Museum of American

Jewish History

Philadelphia, PA

Award: Outright; $250,000.00

Implementation of a traveling exhibition about American composer Leonard Bernstein on the

centennial of his birth.

Media Projects

Development Grants

Oaxacalifornia: The Return

International Documentary Association

Los Angeles, CA

Award: Outright; $48,153.00

Development of a script for a 90-minute documentary film that would explore the

lives of a family of Mexican immigrants living in Fresno, California.

Splitting the Second: The Brilliant, Eccentric Life of Eadweard Muybridge

Inside Out Media

Oakland, CA

Award: Outright; $60,000.00

Scripting of a 90-minute documentary exploring the life and legacy of 19th-century photographer Eadweard Muybridge.

Cartooning America: The Fleischer Brothers Story

Filmmakers Collaborative, Inc.

Melrose, MA

Award: Outright; $60,000.00

Development of a script for a feature-length documentary on the Fleischer brothers, a

family of artists and producers who transformed the aesthetics and business of animation.

Crip Camp: A Documentary

Center for Independent Documentary, Inc.

Boston, MA

Award: Outright; $30,000.00

Match; $10,000.00

Scripting of a 90-minute documentary that chronicles the 1960s and early 1970s summer camp experience of teens with disabilities and follows the lives of several campers, some of whom became lifelong civil rights advocates for people with disabilities.

Jamaica Kincaid Documentary

Women Make Movies, Inc.

New York, NY

Award: Outright; $60,000.00

Development of an 86-minute documentary film on the life and accomplishments of Jamaica

Kincaid, an Antiguan-born novelist and poet.

Production Grants

The Circus

Filmmakers Collaborative, Inc.

Melrose, MA

Award: Outright; $200,000.00

Production of a four-hour documentary film series chronicling the history of the traveling

circus, an American institution, from the late 18th century to the middle of the 20th century.

Itzhak

Independent Feature Project, Inc.

Brooklyn, NY

Award: Outright; $200,000.00

Production of a 90-minute documentary about the Israeli-American violinist, conductor, and

educator Itzhak Perlman.

The 19th Amendment

City Lore: NY Center for Urban Folk Culture

New York, NY

Award: Outright; $350,000.00

Production of a four-hour documentary film about the efforts to pass the Nineteenth

Amendment for women’s voting rights

(1909–20).

The Slave Trade: Creating A New World

Firelight Media, Inc.

New York, NY

Award: Outright; $800,000.00

Production of a four-hour documentary examining the Atlantic slave trade as an agent of

momentous demographic, economic, and moral transformations.

College Behind Bars

Greater Washington Educational Telecommunications Assoc.

Arlington, VA

Award: Outright; $200,000.00

Production of a two-hour documentary that chronicles the intellectual and personal

journeys of men and women who participate in a rigorous liberal arts college program as inmates of New York state prisons.

Cooperative Agreement

Sustaining the NEH on the Road Traveling Exhibition Program

Mid-America Arts Alliance

Kansas City, MO

Award: Outright; $2,500,000.00

Continuation of the NEH on the Road program, offering scaled-down exhibitions to mid-sized

museums in underserved areas from July 2018 to June 2021.

NEH on the Road

The following organizations received $1,000 grants for ancillary public humanities programs to accompany NEH on the Road traveling exhibitions.